Author's note: Hey everyone, FireSlash here welcoming you to another chapter of 'Ring of Hope'. I want to thank all of you who've shown support for the story so far. It means a lot to me :-). Glad to see a lot of you are enjoying this fic. Now, this chapter is going to be a bit of exposition (going over Naegi's training method and having him interact with Maizono and Kuwata for the first time), but next chapter, you'll get to see Naegi with the long, so don't worry. Oh, and the girl Naegi will end up with is still up for debate. Let me know who you wish to see Naegi with in the comments.

If you haven't already, I suggest following my IG account (fire_slash_fanfiction) as I post when I plan to update some fics. It's also the best place to reach me.

Well, I've said all that I have to. Let's get right to the story. Review and enjoy :-).

Edit: Some people felt the training montage was a bit rushed, so I fixed it. Hopefully it's better :-).

0000

Location: Earth

There was a two month gap between the day Naegi received the Blue Lantern ring and his first day at Hope's Peak. It was during this time that Naegi decided that he would train himself on how to better use his new powers. Unlike most heroes who randomly inherit powers and seem to be prodigies on how to use them, Naegi was a complete novice on how to use his ring effectively… sort of. The ring did inject in him the basics on how to use his newfound gifts.

"But where do I start?" The boy asked himself as he stood in a dumpster, one which he knew was unguarded because why would it be in a superhero story? "Hm…"

"Creating a training regime."

"What the?!" Naegi jumped backwards as he heard a voice inside his head. He rapidly moved his head around to survey the area, trying to see who had been talking to him.

"Completed."

From his ring, a blue hologram of a list attached to a clipboard appeared in front of him, nearly causing the boy to have another heart-attack. With a quick glance at his ring, he approached the list. Reading it revealed that all his current powers were on that list along with some recommendations as to how to get started on using them. It didn't take long for Naegi to put two-and-two together.

"Hey, uh, can you hear me?" Naegi awkwardly asked his ring. While it seemed stupid for him to do so from an outsider's perspective, the soon-to-be Ultimate Lucky Student knew that his ring had just mentally communicated to him.

The response was swift. "Indeed."

Naegi didn't know what to do next, so he winged it. "So… who are you? Are you something trapped in my ring or are you something else?"

"I am an AI created to aid you in your endeavors," the ring explained. "You may command me to perform some basic functions, such as to move something with a construct. I can also allow you to translate every language on the Blue Lantern database, which includes all Earth languages, dead and alive. If I detect danger, I'll warn you if you wish."

"Please do." With his luck, danger was something he encountered constantly. To have something that could help him deal with this was a blessing.

"Understood. The settings have been saved. Now, for your training, I'd suggest getting used to activating your protective aura first. It'll prove to be useful in the long run as it'll help protect you from things such as the vacuum of space."

'Well, I doubt I'll ever be in space, but I guess I should do what the ring says for the time being.' Concentrating, the boy was surprised to see that he managed to activate it on the first try. 'I actually did it?'

It only took him a second to realize why this was. When he first got the ring, it installed some sort of training manual into his mind, meaning he wasn't going about this blind. However, the ring didn't really give him the knowledge on how his powers worked. Instead, the ring was more instinctual, Naegi knowing how to use his powers but not knowing the full sciency explanation on how the ring worked.

Because of this, he only spent one day focusing on this power and that was only just to make sure he actually knew what he was doing.

Next on his list was attempting to create objects. Unlike the protective aura, this took a bit longer to master even with the training manual installed into his brain. He was limited to non-living, stationary objects. He could use his ring to move them, but he couldn't make a fully working system. For example, he could make a train, but the technological aspects of it wouldn't work, meaning he couldn't make its tires or brakes do anything. According to his ring, he'd be able to create much more once it deemed him capable enough to do so. He'd even be able to create objects related to his target's psyche, allowing him to potentially calm them down.

However, even with all this knowledge fed to him by his ring, he still had a bit of a problem...

'Rock.' Concentrating, Naegi created a big blue rock that was about three times his size.

'Hammer.' The rock was soon replaced by a hammer.

'Swing.'

Following his mental command, the hammer swung at a broken refrigerator, only to shatter on impact. For some reason, his constructs were very weak.

"Agh! Why isn't this working!?" The boy angrily yelled to himself as he allowed his body to drop to the ground. For a week now, he's been trying to figure out how to make his constructs stronger, but to no effect.

"You need to exhibit more hope," his ring told him for the billionth time.

"I'm giving everything I got here though." Naegi frowned. He poured everything he had mentally into his constructs, but the results were always the same. "What is it that I'm doing wrong?"

For a couple of seconds, Naegi sat in silence, trying to think of a solution. Eventually, he decided to look up the definition of hope, thinking that by doing so, it would give him an idea on what to do next.

"Hope: a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen" was the first definition he got on google. He stared at it for a while. Yes, he desired for a certain thing to happen to the point where he was physically trying to make it happen, but no matter how much he thought about it happening, it never did.

'Wait a second…'

Naegi quickly searched up the definition of willpower.

"Willpower: control exerted to do something or restrain impulses."

He then went back to the definition of hope and started laughing. The reason why his constructs weren'tt working was so obvious to him now. He had been willing the construct to form, but he had not been powering it up. Hope was an emotion, something he couldn't force out of him. He needed to be in-tuned with the emotion. Excitement swelling up in his chest, he began to recreate his hammer.

'Swing.'

When the hammer made contact with the refrigerator, the thing stood no chance as it was flattened to a pancake by the hammer.

"I...did it...YES!" The boy was ecstatic at having accomplished the task, a sense of pride filling inside him. Now that he further understood how the ring worked, he felt things would get easier from now on. He was sort of right...

Adding to his offensive capabilities was the ability to shoot beams of light. However, there was a problem with this power. Naegi found that he could choose to either fire blasts of heat or concussive force after doing a test run.

"Is there a way to make this non-lethal?" Naegi asked his ring as he stared at the giant hole he made in a washing machine. Somehow it managed to burn through the thing. "Or maybe make it so that it doesn't burn?"

"Concussive force can be shot from the ring instead."

Fueling his ring with hope, the boy shot the remainder of the washing machine, making sure that the damage type was switched. Doing so allowed him to knock it back. Still though, that force was enough to kill someone.

"Let's see if we can make this non-lethal to people."

As it turns out, he could. He had the ability to change the intensity of his blasts. How he knew whether a blast would kill someone or not wasn't something he could explain. It simply felt like a gut-feeling and seeing as his knowledge of the powers he could use had a similar explanation, he was going to go with this.

He actually discovered a neat trick regarding firing either. Instead of making the focus point his ring, he could make it his fingers, allowing him to fire weaker, yet more blasts at once.

"Charging these blasts takes a bit of time and are hard to aim," Naegi said to himself one day. "There has to be a way to fix this."

A quick look at his hands was all he needed to figure out a solution. The blast came from his ring, which was one focus point. What if he fired the lasers from multiple areas? Pointing his fingers at a broken sink, he fired several small lasers, chipping away at it.

"Huh, that worked." He had expected it to, especially with the fact constructs weren't always attached to the ring. "Now, let's see if I can change its shape. Maybe making something a bit bigger will help me more.

Thus was how he managed to figure out how to turn the blasts into different shapes. For some reason, his favorite shapes ended up being that of large bullets. Why? He just found it easier to control. Also, despite generally being a pacifist, it just felt right.

"You've got that wrong villain, for I am here," Naegi shouted as he fired a bullet at an empty bottle he found. Despite how corny his line was, he did manage to knock down the bottle.

Alongside all this, the boy was able to fly… but it took him the entire two months to actually be able to effectively. Moving up and down was fine; all he needed to do was to draw enough hope from himself while picking the direction.

"Let's try moving forwards." Digging into his brain for instructions on how to fly, he was surprised to be greeted with the equivalent of an error message, one he did not know the meaning to. Hell, he hardly knew what the error messages he'd occasionally receive on his computer meant.

"The action cannot be completed because the ring's data is corrupted" was his ring's reply when he asked him what the code in his mind meant.

"So I have a broken ring…" Naegi groaned. It seems his luck affected him even if he was lightyears away from an event. "I guess I gotta push myself forwards somehow. Can't be too hard, right?"

Indeed it can. When Naegi aimed to gently push himself, he accidentally flung himself into a pile of trash. Unfortunately, said pile had a huge spike in it and it impaled the poor boy's arm.

Releasing a screech of pain, Naegi attempted to assess his injury. The object went right through his arm, so pulling it out was out of the question. The soon-to-be Ultimate Lucky Student began racking his brain for ways to get out of this situation. He knew that if he left this thing in his arm, he could run the risk of dying from blood loss. With his free hand, he reached for his phone to call an ambulance, but suddenly, he took another glance at the spike. For some reason, he felt that an ambulance wasn't needed. He could heal himself.

Concentrating, the boy watched in amazement as his wound began to close, pushing the spike out of his body. In less than a minute, his entire arm was fine despite it most likely needing to be amputated moments prior.

"That's amazing." It was the only thing Naegi could say. Being able to heal from such drastic wounds was unbelievable. He would get ample time to test out his new power as every time he tried to fly, he'd have an accident which would cause him to break a limb. He discovered that if he left the injury alone, it would heal in ten minutes instead of the typical one minute if he concentrated on doing so. Supposedly, the ring could heal others as well, but he really hadn't tried testing it out as he had no one he could use as a practice dummy. He wasn't about to hurt his family just to do so, especially when he wanted to maintain a secret identity. His reasoning for this was because it was simply the best thing for him to do. He's read enough comics and manga to realize why this was and if he was going to be a superhero (at least, that's the path Blue Lanterns were destined to go down based on what Saint Walker told him), he was going to play it safe. He had the power to help others and he was going to do so, but he wanted to make sure no one would be in danger as a result of his actions. He would have to test it out while actually on the field, which made him uneasy. What if he failed to save someone from death?

Alongside mastering his healing abilities, he also managed to get flight down, learning how to propel himself through the air. With help from his ring, he was able to use the process of moving himself vertically as a baseline to mastering how to fly horizontally. He was still rusty, but at least he could get around now.

The ring also granted him for the time being the ability to alter his body. When he realized that he had this power, he began getting excited.

"Wait, does that mean I can make myself taller?!" No longer would he be a shorty. He immediately began to attempt to put some height on him, but stopped as he remembered what happened while he was training his flight. What if his ring glitched out during his transformation. He didn't want to accidentally turn himself into an unholy abomination. As such, he decided that he wasn't going to touch this power with a ten foot pole… for now. "Yeah, let's save that for another time."

Finally, the ring gave him the ability to create a costume for himself, an oddly convenient feature, although one he expected seeing as the Green Lanterns of Earth all had this power. Unlike those who were limited to using green, white, and black in their costumes, his costume was limited to using the colors blue, white, and black. Such made sense to the boy though as blue was the signature color of the Blue Lanterns.

When creating his costume, he had images of the Green Lanterns of Earth opened on his computer while having a hologram of the typical Blue Lantern costume displayed. He had to do this in his room, but he made sure to lock the door.

"Everyone here has skin-tight suits, but that doesn't really fit me. I'm more of a hoodie guy." It was true. He hardly went anywhere without the damn thing. Taking out a spare set of his clothes, he laid it down on his bed and began thinking. A few minutes later, he had an epiphany.

As a base, he'd use his regular clothes. His jacket and his pants were to be black he decided. His hoodie was to be blue and he had white gloves form over his hands in addition to having blue boots which reached halfway to his knees. Thanks to his ring, he was able to attach them to his pants and make it look as if they were one item. He also had a face mask modeled after those of the Green Lanterns and made sure to always wear his hoodie over his head. As mentioned before, he was not taking any chances. Thankfully, his ring could control the temperature in an area equivalent to that of his protective aura, even when the aura itself wasn't around, so he never had to worry about being too hot or cold ever again.

"Ok, this looks great." Staring at himself in the mirror, Naegi had to admit that his costume was perfect for him. "It's settled, this is my hero look."

Now, the ring did have the potential to do so much more, such as granting its user invisibility, intangibility, mind control, and full on regeneration (like growing a new arm after the old one was removed), but as Saint Walker explained, those were locked for the time being until Naegi got better at handling his other powers. There was also the fact that he could supposedly see glimpses of the future, but he had no idea how that worked. He asked his ring about it, but all it said was that it happens randomly. As such, he left that power alone.

To conclude his training, Naegi decided to do some cardio and weightlifting, using his constructs to help create the necessary tools for the latter. Thankfully, as he discovered when playing around with the constructs, he could increase or decrease their weight as needed. With him now being a hero, he thought it was time for him to get into shape. While his ring did increase his speed when flying and his reaction time, his strength wasn't touched. He could increase it with his constructs, but without them, he was simply a normal human. Thankfully, his training did help him shape up. Sure, he wasn't at the level of an athlete as he only started exercising regularly, but he wasn't weak anymore. He no longer wanted to cry after running a mile, which itself was an accomplishment to the boy. Now, some might question why he wasn't learning how to fight, but there was a reason for this. Attending Hope's Peak meant that he would meet some of the most talented fighters of all time. Heck, one of his classmates was going to be the 'Ultimate Martial Artist'. He was planning on learning from them, at least, those who were willing to teach him.

With these two months of training, Naegi felt he was soon ready to go out in the field. However, he still had one obstacle to overcome: his first day at Hope's Peak. Then again, how bad could it be?

0000

"I can't believe this is happening…" Makoto Naegi said as he stared at Hope's Peak. Today was his first day of school and the boy was nervous. He was like a gizelle who had wandered into a pack of hungry lions. His classmates were some of the most talented people alive and he sort of felt like an outlier. Clutching his ring, he remembered that maybe he had more in common with his classmates than he initially thought. After all, all of them were just trying to live their everyday lives. Some were born with incredible talent, some trained to be able to have a talent to call their own, and some had magical rings thrusted upon them and were charged with being a superhero. Yeah, as long as he remembered that his classmates were human, then he could survive being around them.

Taking a deep breath in and exhaling loudly, Naegi decided he had enough of standing outside the building. "Alright, let's do this." Steeling his nerves, the boy began to make his first steps towards the next three years of his life. He had a speech to attend to… that he was thirty minutes late for. He ended up tripping over a rock and missed his train by mere seconds…

0000

'Wow… that took longer than I thought it would,' Naegi thought to himself as the opening ceremony concluded. What the assembly was about, Naegi couldn't tell other than the fact that the school's guidelines were read and that everyone was given their Electro-IDs. The Electro-IDs were basically small tablets which students used for identification. They also had a mini-map of the school, something Naegi thought was neat. Other than the information about the Electro-IDs, the only parts he paid attention to were when the headmaster mentioned how classes weren't mandatory.

Once the ceremony was over, Naegi flew out (not literally), desperately wanting to be anywhere else. Having been in the auditorium for what felt like three hours really got to the boy.

0000

The first day of classes was not how he expected it would be. While this was Hope's Peak, Naegi was expecting something more tame for his first homeroom class, not what he ended up experiencing.

"Mornin' class," Kizakura slurred before taking a sip of his flask. It didn't take a genius to know he had snuck alcohol inside. "The name's Kizakura and I'll be your homeroom teacher this year."

'How did someone like him get a job at Hope's Peak?' The entire class asked as they watched their teacher sway a bit.

"Anyways, I'm going to skip all the disciplinary bullshit I'm supposed to tell you because it's not important. Just get up there and start introducing yourselves. You'll be spending quite some time with each other, so might as well get friendly."

After taking some time to process what they had just witnessed, everyone began to introduce themselves.

"I am Kiyotaka Ishimaru," the Ultimate Moral Compass said, taking the initiative. According to Naegi's research, he was a boy of extraordinary intellect and discipline. Apparently, he knew a bit of kendo as well, so he was willing, the Moral Compass could help Naegi learn to fight… as strange as that sounds. "I value the rules and studying. I hope we can enjoy a neat and orderly four years together."

"Sup! I'm Aoi Asahina, but my friends just call me Hina," the Ultimate Swimmer stated, going after Ishimaru. Naegi didn't need to look far to find information about her, the girl already being eyed as a future member of the Japanese Olympics team. She might actually have some tips to increase his endurance, so he should try talking to her when he gets the chance. "I like swimming and donuts."

The Ultimate Fanfic Writer was up next. "My name is Hifumi Yamada. 'The man who is the beginning and the end.' You can call me either one, I don't mind." From what Naegi could gather, the boy was a strong writer, being able to sell thousands of copies of his works at a single school festival. He had a lot of knowledge on the world of superheroes, so maybe Naegi could try getting some information from him that could help him activate the rest of his abilities quickly. Sure, Blue Lanterns weren't known on Earth, but Green Lanterns were. They appeared to be similar, so maybe some of the stuff the Green Lanterns learned about their powers could apply to a Blue Lantern as well.

"I am Sakura Ogami, Ultimate Martial Artist," the martial artist introduced herself. Apparently, this girl never lost a fight in her life. She was one of the people he wanted to aid him in getting stronger for obvious reasons.

"Sup dudes, I'm Leon Kuwata. While I'm here due to baseball, I'm trying to become the Ultimate Musician." Like Asahina, information about Kuwata wasn't hard to find seeing as he was considered to be one of the best baseball players alive. Naegi did find it somewhat strange that he wanted to change his talent, but there was probably a good reason for his decision, although he should think of getting a different sort of musical title as there already was an 'Ultimate Musician' in the school. He was also someone who could give him pointers regarding exercising.

"Sup! The name's Yasuhiro Hagakure, but you can just call me Hiro," the Ultimate Clairvoyant said. Just by looking at him, Naegi knew he was an interesting character. After all, he was definitely older than the other students. As for his title, supposedly he has a thirty percent chance at correctly predicting the future. Although it initially doesn't seem like much, being right about something you shouldn't know about thirty percent of the time was pretty impressive.

"I-I'm Chihiro Fujisaki, the Ultimate Programmer. I-I hope we can get along." While not really all that interested in the programming scene, Naegi knew how important the shy girl standing in front of him was, her being the leading force behind a technological revolution which was stirring up. Fujisaki was considered by many to be one of the most intelligent people to ever exist.

'Would she be able to hack into my ring?' Naegi asked himself, mostly out of curiosity. The ring was a piece of technology, but did Fujisaki know anything about alien hardware? Sure, she was the 'Ultimate Programmer', but any knowledge on how to use alien technology was a well kept secret available only to those in high government positions.

"Greetings. My name is Celestia Ludenberg, but you can just call me Celes. I am the Ultimate Gambler. Pleased to make your acquaintance." According to the online forums, Celestia Ludenberg had caused many casinos to shut down due to her gambling skills. She was considered by many to be a dangerous person, something Naegi picked up on when she did her introduction. She was definitely putting up a facade to hide her true self. But who was the real Celestia Ludenberg? Naegi sort of wanted to find out. When people put up fake personas, they were usually ashamed of their real selves or were hiding something.

"N-not that y-you'll remember anyways, b-but I'm T-Toko Fukawa, the U-ultimate Writing Prodigy." Fukawa was a well known writer of romance novels, some of which Komaru owned. He honestly expected the writer to be a bit less fidgety.

"My name is Byakuya Togami, the Ultimate Affluent Prodigy." The Togami family was one of the most powerful families in the world, owning large amounts of stocks in several of the biggest businesses to exist. It is because of this that they had access to resources no one else did. Whether that extended to the most high kept government secrets Naegi couldn't say. "Do not treat me like I am one of you. I am on a different level completely."

"Kyoko Kirigiri, Ultimate Detective." Besides himself, the detective was the only person to not have any information about them posted online, so Naegi didn't know much about her. "For those of you wondering, yes, my father is the headmaster. That's all I'm willing to say on the subject."

"The name's Mondo Oowada, Ultimate Biker Gang Leader. Nice to fucking meet you." Oowada was the leader of the biker gang known as the Crazy Diamonds. Despite the fact the gang avoided having fights where civilians were, Oowada was known for his crazy temper and how he packs quite the punch. He was another option regarding getting someone to help train him to fight, but he wasn't sure how that'd work out. He could be much nicer than his reputation suggests though, so Naegi was willing to give him a chance.

"Heey~ I'm Junko Enoshima, Ultimate Fashionista! Charmed aren't we?" Enoshima introduced herself with fake excitement. Like with Celestia, it seemed she was putting on a facade, but of what sort, Naegi didn't know. If only he had known about the darkness that smile was hiding earlier. "Next to me is my sister."

"I'm Mukuro Ikusaba," the older twin said with an emotionless expression, trying to remain professional. "The Ultimate Soldier."

Naegi could've sworn that the class's atmosphere dropped upon hearing that a killer was in their class. While a bit afraid himself, Naegi realized that if the headmaster was allowing her to attend school, then she was deemed safe to be around. As she walked to her seat, Naegi gave her a small smile. For some reason, Ikusaba quickly looked away in response, seemingly out of embarrassment. Perhaps she wasn't used to such gestures from strangers?

"I'm Sayaka Maizono, the Ultimate Idol. It's nice to meet all of you." Maizono was someone he could easily recognize. They did go to the same middle-school after all, although they never interacted once. He understood why though as nearly everyone tried befriending her. Taking a quick glance at the idol, he noticed that she seemed to be staring at him. Did she perhaps recognize him from their old school? While a possibility, Naegi seriously doubted this was the case. She was the most popular girl in school and he was an average joe. No way would she remember someone like him…

When Maizono took her seat, Naegi realized that he was the only person in his class who has yet to introduce themselves. Standing up, Naegi made his way to the front of the classroom.

Taking a deep breath in, Naegi smiled at his classmates. "Hi everyone, my name's Makoto Naegi, I'm this year's Ultimate Lucky Student. I was chosen to come here through a lottery. It's nice to meet all of you. Hopefully we can all be friends…"

Naegi knew he could feel some judgemental glances being thrown his way, but he expected this. He was an ordinary joe in a school filled with some of the most talented people alive. Then again, he was perhaps the least ordinary person of his class now that he had the Blue Lantern ring.

0000

"Well, I see no reason to keep you here any longer," Kizakura admitted, swaying a bit from his unhealthy obsession with alcohol. "There are no classes today and orientation was yesterday. See y'all in class tomorrow… at least, those who decide to show up."

Huh, that was unexpected. Sure, he knew classes were not mandatory, but he thought that the day would have lasted longer.

"Wait sensei!" Ishimaru called out, having several questions he wanted to ask. Sadly, the drunk teacher ignored him, opting to leave the classroom instead of dealing with his students. A loud 'thud' later and Kizakura passed out in the middle of the hallway. Unknown to the boy, this is actually quite common.

Watching this, Naegi rubbed his head. Hope's Peak was nothing like he expected. Non-mandatory classes and drunk teachers were not what one would normally find in an 'elite' school. He was still going to attend classes though. Unlike nearly everyone else in this school, he couldn't rely on his talent to get far in life, especially with luck like his, so a chance at being educated by some of the most talented people alive wasn't something he was going to pass up.

Glancing at his classmates, Naegi noticed some of them began to leave. Celestia was the first to go, giving everyone a polite curtsy before ditching. Togami took a glance at everyone before deciding to go as well. Fukawa scurried out of the classroom afterwards, no doubt eager to get away from everyone. The twins were the next to go, neither one acknowledging their classmates. Finally, Kirigiri abruptly stood up and walked out. Everyone else however decided to stay and socialize.

'Wow, they didn't waste any time,' Naegi thought to himself, debating on if he should leave as well. The idea of meeting his new classmates stopped him in his tracks though. It would be best to develop some sort of relationship before asking them to train him after all. Before he could stand up and speak to his classmates, he felt the presence of someone approaching him.

"Hi Naegi, it's nice to see you again."

Blinking, he looked up from his desk and was met with the sight of Maizono looking down at him, a small smile plastered on her face. Deciding that it would be rude to ignore her, Naegi shot her a soft smile. "Hey Maizono, nice to meet you."

Hearing this, Maizono's smile turned into a frown. "Meet me? Don't you remember our time in middle school together?"

"You remember me?" Naegi asked, genuinely shocked that Japan's most famous idol recognized a nobody like him. "How? We never talked and I didn't do anything all that interesting…"

"That's not true. I was always hearing about all the kind things you did for everyone at our old school. I've been dying to find an excuse to talk to you, but unfortunately I was always busy with my fans."

Naegi couldn't help but blush. Who knew he had the ability to catch the attention of an idol? Honestly, the feats she was describing weren't special. All he did was help a crane that got stuck in the school's pool and volunteered for some fundraising events.

"You'd be surprised how many people were inspired by your actions," Maizono said, startling Naegi. Did she just read his mind?

"D-did I say all that out loud?"

"Nope. I'm psychic." Glancing at the boy's startled expression, Maizono let loose a small giggle. "Just kidding, I just have really good intuition."

'Too good if you ask me,' Naegi thought to himself. If her intuition was as powerful as she claimed, then he needed to keep his guard up around her at all times. He didn't want her to find out about the ring. "Makes sense. I'm guessing you have to have a sharp mind to be in the entertainment business."

"Yep." Despite her trying to hide it, Naegi managed to pick up a few traces of fear and sadness in her eyes. Why this was, he had no idea. All he knew was that he needed to change the subject.

"Damn Naegi, you grew up with Maizono?" Kuwata asked, walking towards them and thankfully providing a much needed shift in discussion. Naegi was sort of confused as to why, but hey, it gave the boy a chance to talk to him. Maizono however knew exactly what was going on, but she continued to smile, not giving anything away. "I see why they call you the 'Ultimate Lucky Student.'" He stuck a hand out to the Lucky Student. "Leon Kuwata, nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too," Naegi said with a smile, glad to be making a new friend.

Kuwata soon turned his attention towards Maizono and gave her a swave grin. Well, he thought he was being cool, but in reality he looked a bit goofy. "Maizono."

"Kuwata," the idol greeted him with her signature smile. Naegi suddenly felt the atmosphere around him become tense. Unknown to him, Kuwata was hoping to charm Maizono while the idol in return had caught on to what he was doing and wanted no part in this. She's had her fair share of people hit on her, so she was able to smell his intent from a mile away.

"You're just the person I was hoping to see. You probably heard me before, but I was hoping to change my talent to the 'Ultimate Musician'".

"Uh Kuwata, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there's already an 'Ultimate Musician' in the year above us," Naegi told him.

Kuwata gave him a disappointed glance. "Really? Crap..."

"That's not to say that you can't go for another musically related talent," Naegi added, not wanting to crush the boy's dream. "I mean, music has many genres, right?"

"Right!" Just like that, Kuwata went from disappointed to motivated. "The 'Ultimate Musician' title may be taken, but I can still become the 'Ultimate Punk Star'! Thanks Naegi!"

"Uh, you're welcome?" It wasn't like he did anything. Kuwata would've found out about the 'Ultimate Musician' without him.

Kuwata shifted his focus back to Maizono. "I was wondering if you could hook me up with a manager or something! I could give you a private concert in my dorm once I finish unpacking if you'd like and you'll see how much of a badass I am at music!"

"Sorry, I have to unpack my dorm as well," Maizono told him, giving out a fake excuse.

Kuwata was a bit more stubborn than she thought however. "Eh, no biggie. I can play for you tomorrow if you'd like."

"Maybe…"

Naegi watched this conversation go down and he had an important question. "Wait, hold on, you have dorms?"

"Yeah," Maizono said, glad for an excuse to remove herself from Kuwata's advances. "Our acceptance letters came with applications for a dorm. Hope's Peak has a limited amount of them and some are used by our upperclassmen. The ones they don't use are free for us freshmen to use."

"I never got the forum…" Naegi frowned. Unknown to him, the envelope his letter came in ended up not being sealed well, so the forum fell out as it was being mailed. Don't get him wrong, he loved his family, but he wanted to try out dorming. Then again, dorming would have been a bad idea. Hope's Peak had some important people living in their campus, so the place would be highly monitored. There was no way he'd be able to sneak out to do some hero work without being noticed, especially since he couldn't become invisible yet.

Maizono gave him a sympathetic frown. "Really? That sucks. Well, you're more than free to hang out in mine if you'd like. I do want to make up for lost time after all."

Despite being an innocent offer, Naegi couldn't help but blush at the idea of a girl inviting him to her room, said girl being the 'Ultimate Idol' no less.

"Same here," Kuwata said, giving the boy a friendly pat on the back.

Naegi smiled at the kindness the two were showing him. "Thanks guys."

'This kid's got some moves,' Kuwata thought to himself as he saw how easy it was for the boy to interact with the idol. 'I gotta get him to teach me how he does it…'

0000

Author's note 2: As you can see, I've set up the road for several interactions in this fic. While Maizono and Kuwata will be the two who hang out with him the most (not counting his love interest once that's determined), I do plan on having him interact with his classmates, class 77, the Children of Hope, and the V3 gang in the future. In addition, some characters of the Green Lantern mythos will be making an appearance. In fact, a certain Red Lantern will be having a big role to play in this story...